Week 2: Muddiest Point

I might have missed this in class, but my question is on the slide for common printers, slide 69. I was wondering what is the definition of a nonimpact printer? Do nonimpact printers have a counterpart, such as an impact printer? If so, what is the difference?

Week 2 Comments

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Week 2 Readings

This summer I was sitting in a lecture at the Municipal Library of Prague. The speaker took out a 2 GB SD USB memory card, and declared 8,000 books could fit on it. More books, he claimed, than anyone could read in a life-time. A sculpture in the main entrance (the picture to the right) was made of 8,000 books to illustrate the difference in size. If you looked inside, two mirrors projected into infinity.

The observation by Moore on the continuing advances with the size of transistors can take what fills a story of a building and put it onto a disk that is less than an inch long.




Here are some thoughts on the articles read for class, not nearly as interesting as the pictures above.

1.) Computer Hardware

This article was a quick overview of what is inside a computer and how the internal parts are connected, and why they are important. On a personal note, I had a computer in the mid-90's where the internal fan broke. No one in the house could figure out where the smell of melting plastic was coming from, until we touched the CPU tower. As we waiting for the new fan to arrive in the mail (it was still under warranty), we came up with a novel solution to the broken internal fan. We removed the CPU case and put a small personal fan next to the CPU. When the computer was turned on, the fan was as well.

I wish the Bus Controllers would have been better defined, even though some of them are outdated or being phased out. Speaking of being phased out, recently I was looking into buying a new laptop and I noticed that getting a modem is now an option I would have to pay for ($44.00 if you use your student discount on apple.com). I found that shocking, but also understandable. Less people have dial up because of the amount of data they may be downloading.

2.) Moore's Law - wikipedia & video - the doubling of transistors

When thinking about this law in relation to digital camera's it makes perfect sense. From my first camera to the one I have now the prices were around the same, but I went from 3.0 mega pixels to 8 mega pixels in six years. When I got my first camera in 2003 I don't remember seeing ones with that resolution.

3.) Computer History Museum

I was unaware, but not surprised such a place existed. It is located in California, and it is free to the public. I liked their online exhibits. The visual examples of the dramatic changes in the size of computers was fascinating, to see the change from Babbage Engine to a tiny computer chip.


I also have a question, is there a way I can put all of the blogs into one blog feed?